CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
315 km from Olbernhau to Olbernhau, about 6 h 27 of riding. It goes by way of Annaberg-Frohnau Mining Landscape, The Red Tower of Death, Buchholz Mining Landscape and Eibenstock Mining Landscape. It crosses from Germany into Czechia - carry ID and check vignette or toll rules. It suits an unhurried touring pace.
Down in the valley of the Flöha, on the edge of Olbernhau, stands an industrial village that looks almost too neat to be real: slate-roofed workshops, a hammer mill, workers' houses and a stout gatehouse, all enclosed within a wall. This is the Saigerhütte Grünthal, a works that separated silver from copper ore by a technique called liquation, and it is one of the best preserved sites of its kind in Europe. It forms part of the Erzgebirge/Krušnohoří Mining Region, listed by UNESCO in 2019 for both the German and Czech sides of the range.
Read the complete Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works is where the day begins. Next is Annaberg-Frohnau Mining Landscape.
Silver built Annaberg. In the late fifteenth century rich silver ore was found in the Erzgebirge, the Ore Mountains on the border between Saxony and Bohemia, and a town was founded almost overnight in 1496 to house the miners. Within a few decades Annaberg was one of the largest towns in Saxony, and its wealth paid for the St. Annenkirche, one of the most beautiful late Gothic hall churches in Germany, with slender pillars branching into a star-ribbed vault like the trunks of trees.
Read the complete Annaberg-Frohnau Mining Landscape write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Annaberg-Frohnau Mining Landscape comes up about 37 km into the recorded legs. Next is The Red Tower of Death.
The name sounds like a horror film, and the reality was grim enough. In the 1950s, the communist government of Czechoslovakia sent tens of thousands of political prisoners to labour camps in the Jáchymov region to mine uranium for the Soviet nuclear programme. In a red brick building near Ostrov, known as the Red Tower of Death, prisoners crushed and sorted uranium ore by hand, without protection, exposed to dust and radiation. Many died or suffered lasting illness. The building is now a memorial, part of the Erzgebirge/Krušnohoří Mining Region World Heritage listing, and a powerful reminder of the human cost of the Cold War.
Read the complete The Red Tower of Death write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 76 km into the recorded legs you reach The Red Tower of Death. Next is Buchholz Mining Landscape.
The twin towns of Annaberg and Buchholz grew from silver. In the late fifteenth century a strike in the Ore Mountains set off a rush, and Annaberg was founded as a mining town with remarkable speed, while neighbouring Buchholz joined it later to form the double-barrelled name you see on the signs. The wealth shows in the St Annen church, a vast late-Gothic hall with a soaring vault, which stands over the market square like a promise made by men who suddenly had money. The wider mining landscape was inscribed by UNESCO in 2019, with its counterpart across the border in Jáchymov, where silver coins were once minted that gave the world the word thaler, and eventually the dollar.
Read the complete Buchholz Mining Landscape write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Buchholz Mining Landscape, about halfway. Next is Eibenstock Mining Landscape.
Eibenstock sits high in the western Erzgebirge, at about six hundred metres above the sea, in a country of spruce forests and cold, clear streams. It owes its origins to tin: miners worked the tin deposits here from the Middle Ages, and the mining landscape around the town, with old spoil heaps, shafts and water channels, is part of the Erzgebirge/Krušnohoří Mining Region, which UNESCO recognised in 2019. Today, the traces are quiet, softened by moss and birch.
Read the complete Eibenstock Mining Landscape write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Eibenstock Mining Landscape sits at 149 km, about halfway. Next is back through Buchholz Mining Landscape.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Buchholz Mining Landscape write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Buchholz Mining Landscape comes up about 198 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through The Red Tower of Death.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete The Red Tower of Death write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 237 km into the recorded legs you reach back through The Red Tower of Death. Next is back through Annaberg-Frohnau Mining Landscape.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Annaberg-Frohnau Mining Landscape write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Annaberg-Frohnau Mining Landscape, late in the day. Next is Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 315 km.
Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works → Annaberg-Frohnau Mining Landscape is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Annaberg-Frohnau Mining Landscape → The Red Tower of Death is 39 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
The Red Tower of Death → Buchholz Mining Landscape is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Buchholz Mining Landscape → Eibenstock Mining Landscape is 43 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Eibenstock Mining Landscape → back through Buchholz Mining Landscape is 39 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Buchholz Mining Landscape → back through The Red Tower of Death is 39 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through The Red Tower of Death → back through Annaberg-Frohnau Mining Landscape is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Annaberg-Frohnau Mining Landscape → Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works is 38 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.